Cast In Ice

There's been alot of talk about Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell. Alot of people think that his career is going down hill after his recent loss to Quinton "Rampage" Jackson where he was, for lack of a better word, completely demolished.

Alot of the people who are talking are old hardcore fans of the sport, people who have watched the PRIDE Fighting Championships and know about the UFC's new aquisitions of 205 pound fighters like #1 ranked Mauricio "Shogun" Rua, former PRIDE 205 pound champion Wanderlei "The Axe Murderer" Silva and Judo master Kazuhiro Nakamura.

While these aqcuisitions are great for the sport and those of us who wanted to see top tier matchups with guys like Shogun and Wanderlei stepping into the cage, I have to admit that I am not sure they are right to say that Liddell is done, so I wanted to put together a profile of Liddell's career to explain exactly why.

Chuck Liddell was one of the few fighters to make his mixed martial arts debut in the UFC after the initial UFC tournaments. He fought at UFC 17 against Noe Hernandez, and won a decision. The UFC wasn't impressed and released Liddell, but they quickly brought him back after he won his next fight (another decision).

Still a rookie in the sport he ended up fighting veteran and master submission fighter Jeremy Horn. People forget that, at this point in his career, Liddell was a wrestler. He had been a Division I wrestler at California Polytechnical University and was starting to develop his striking skills, but he tried to ground and pound Horn with his wrestling backround.

Jeremy Horn sunk in a triangle choke off of his back, but Liddell refused to tap and when the referee ended the round, they found that Liddell was unconscious and unable to continue. Since that fight, Liddell has not been caught in a submission.

Liddell choked out his next opponent in another organization and then was brought back to the UFC. This is where he began to get his monoker "The Iceman" and develop the legendary, powerful and unorthodox striking style for which he would become a fixture in the 205 pound division.

Liddell went 4-0 in his UFC matches, KOing all of his opponents except for legendary submission fighter Jeff "The Snowman" Monson, who outweighed Liddell by 20 pound, but Liddell still managed to defeat with a decision.

"The Iceman" then turned to the PRIDE Fighting Championships to try his luck and knocked out Ken Shamrock's student Guy Mezger in the second round.

Aparently, something about the cage appealed to Liddell and he came back to the Octagon to fight. He proceeded to stretch his winning streak to 10-0, adding former champions Murilo Bustamante, Vitor Belfort to a list that already included former heavyweight champion and wrestling legend Kevin "The Monster" Randleman. Other wins during this time period include his highlight KO of Renato "Babalu" Sobral and a hard fought decision over Russian Amar Suloev.

Liddell was then given the opportunity to fight for the Interim UFC title at 205 pounds, put into place when Tito Ortiz was having disputes with the UFC management. Former heavyweight champion Randy Couture was expected to struggle with the standup Liddell had showcased in his previous fights and the sprawl that had allowed him to be Randleman (who, like Couture, held both the UFC Heavyweight title and the NCAA title as a wrestler).

Couture would shock the world by beating Liddell standing up, and the fight was stopped at 2:39 seconds in the third round.

Then, Liddell would return to PRIDE, where he beat Dutch kickboxer Alistair Overeem before he lost to Rampage Jackson for the first time. Liddell's second loss in three fights put him in a tough position, as Rampage didn't even go on to win the tournament they were fighting in, which made Liddell look even worse.

Some people thought that the loss to Couture had shaken his confidence. The UFC management, though, seemed to disagree. They brought back Liddell to fight the winningest 205 pound champion in the history of the UFC: Tito "The Huntington Beach Bad Boy" Ortiz.

While the rest of Ortiz's career was also questionable, Liddell proved that his wasn't. He put on a highlight reel performance against Ortiz and the fight was stopped at 38 seconds in the second round.

Chuck then destroyed Lion's Den fighter Vernon White who, though game, was completely overwhelmed by Liddell's power and the fight was stopped four minutes into round one.

With that win, Liddell put himself in position for a shot against Randy Couture. No one could be completely sure how Liddell would fair against Couture, because of the way he had been beaten in his own arena in their previous fight, but anyone who thought he had no chance was proved wrong. Liddell KO'd The Natural in 2:06.

Liddell would then go on to be dominant at 205 pounds. He began by avenging his loss against Jeremy Horn with a fourth round TKO. What's really notable about this fight is that while Horn was the UFC's most experienced fighter, he hadn't been KO'd in 94 fights. The Iceman then allowed Couture, Sobral and Ortiz to try their chances with a rematch, he beat all of them with strikes.

While Liddell lost to Rampage, we can't forget that in his rematch with Sobral, Liddell was reportedly paid $200,000, making him the highest paid fighter in the UFC at the time. It's also reported that he was paid more for the Ortiz fight.

All of that beside, before his loss to Jackson, Chuck Liddell was the longest standing and most well known UFC fighter. Questioning his ability and his drive, and possibly his future is something that has been done before.

We did it before the second fight with Couture, before the second fight with Horn. We did it after he initially lost to Horn and left the UFC. He was questioned after his loss to Jackson in PRIDE, before fighting the former champion Ortiz.

Well, I guess we'll never learn.